Americans are spending enough to keep the economy rolling, but don't expect them to splurge unless their paychecks start to grow. Neil Shah reports on the News Hub. Photo: Getty Images.

This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.

... the the ... Americans are ... spending enough to keep the economy going ... early in ... life ... when they published their paychecks until still can an expansion continue Wall Street Journal economics reporter Neil Shah ... has jumped in on to my right knee on the morning are you ... I'm good so ... will tell us what what is good data ... showing us about how we deserve trending ... basically the colonies from the improving ... home values are going up the stock market's doing great ... one problem is that workers basically are really making them what's more money than they use to ... at the end of the recession average real wages are art down any future owner Leslie five years on average hourly pay is actually down slightly but two point nine percent ... that's a problem I mean consumer confidence can be a unified year plus six year levels ... aam and people can feel better especially people higher in ... the fundamental problem with the economy ... continues to be that workers ... worker pay wages are going here's what I don't get ... explaining how all ... if wages are going up ... he can and GDP is really just a measure of spending ... overall ... happen the economy be growing ... um we're just borrowing more and ... the resilient consumer that we heard so much about in the nineties in the end of one of the trail is one reason we've seen this in the past is that even if ... consumers don't necessarily have more money in their paychecks to actually ... barring from the future by a ... unit ... of expanding their spending via credit and barring a lot we did see earlier this year ... some encouraging signs in the consumer spending from the same time it's like consumers for dipping into their savings ... in order to finance that spending what would be good is to see a ... a healthy savings rate at the same time ... um higher wages higher incomes and having that finance spending that leads to a little bit more resilient ... recovery that the Fed's not letting if if people are saving ... they're not spending and that's not in a jar the economy in the Fed doesn't want people to say that once the economy to grow up we were getting ... mixed signals here it's a tough situation because one of the major reasons why we each growth has been so weak is something very simple it's that the eco economy remains fairly lethargic ... we've had ... basically three straight quarters of some two percent growth that's compared to but the country use to ... essentially average over the long two or three point five percent ... in a weak economy is not a lot of demand for workers it is not on the demand for workers ... and employers are simply under little pressure to raise wages and also some ... kind of more complicated reasons for why we could maybe kept ... some researchers and think that the sentences go Fed have pointed out that ... typically um a couple of cars ... and employers ... to ... reduce wages ... in in in a bad economy and in racing when things get better and not happening this time warp in recent years ... simply because ... companies feel more comfortable firing some workers ... and in keeping wages at the same place ... rather than ... boring wages which demoralize is the entire workforce that kind of called troll changed how employers are having